Joseph's nightmare
by Sjeherazade
Summary: This is a story that takes part many years before Joseph is thrown into the pit, even many years before his brothers started to hate him, most of Jacobs children are still inocent children... And the Devil loves to play with inocent children...
1. Chapter 1

A/N: When this story takes part Reuben is 17 years old, Simeon is 16, Levi 14, Judah 11, Dan 9, Naphtali and Gad 8, Asher and Issachar 7, Zebulon 6, Dinah and Joseph 4 and Benjamin 2.

A/N/2: As I'm a protestantic Christian I'm interpreting the Bible the way I want (because I have to) – (I don't think that will be a problem in this story but if it is… Let's just say that I don't care who is like my way or not)

A/N/3: As I'm not using English as my first language, I apologize for the spelling mistakes that might be in this story. I'm trying, and that is a promise. (If you find something that is really terrible, please tell me, so I'm not doing the same mistake over and over again.)

A/N/4: And I'm sorry if some chapters are very short. I lack in inspiration this time.

And as I think everyone had already guessed, I'm not own this characters.

One character I actually own is: Millennia (Dan's goat)

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_**Chapter 1 **_

The mysterious disease had ravaged in a week. Nobody knew what it was, one day Asher had collapsed in the field. Someone had carried him home and tucked him in and then he had been sleeping the entire day, for some hours he had even been unconscious.

Next day Dan and Joseph got sick too, in the same way and in the end of the week Naphtali, Zebulon, and Dinah was lying too. They were weak with fever and very dry and the sickness refuse to let them go.

On the eighth day, someone found a medallion that had belonged to Rachel. They hang out it to bring some hope and luck, and to protect and cure the family. It hadn't helped. Admittedly, no one else had been ill, but to those who was already suffering, nothing had happened.

Day nine Dinah had actually been up for a while, about 30 minutes. Then she had fallen asleep again. Now it was eleven days after that and there hadn't been any more such miracles.

Finally Jacob gave up and decided to find someone who knew what to do and some medicine.

Jacob, his wives and, (to give the suffering children some time to rest), all the healthy sons would go to the village to speak with a doctor. Judah was left at home to look after the others and everything else. He was old enough to make it, the adults decided.

Judah agreed. He had actually feed their animals himself many times before without any mistakes and the field could wait one day his father had decided before leaving. And six _babies_ who was lying in bed all the time couldn't make so many problems…


	2. Chapter 2

_**Chapter 2**_

Judah walked out to the goat to give her some new water, but he decided that he could clean it at the same time so he untied it and was about to walk down to the lake with her when he caught sight of Joseph. He had evidently woken up and walked out. Judah called him back.

"Where are you going, shouldn't you rest?" he gripped his brothers arm with one hand and knit the goat with the other. But when he wanted to go back in, Joseph refused.

"What is wrong with you?"

"It will collapse …"

"What will collapse?"

"The mountain, it will collapse and bury us all!" Judah looked suspiciously on the mountain. It looked very stable. He glared at Joseph again.

"Would that mountain collapse?! Where have you got that idea from?" Joseph looked at the mountain too, he looked completely horror-struck. Judah made a fist with anger.

"It's alright. It's just that fever that makes you dream strange things." Joseph's eyes narrowed.

"It's _not_ the fever and by the way, that goat is going to escape." That was enough, Judah took Josephs other hand, walked back inside and tucked him in again. Then he walked outside again. The goat had escaped.

First Judah stared suspiciously at the mountain.

"No, it will _not_, and the goat escaped because that kid distracted me." He said to himself.

He walked back in to speak with Joseph about that but he had fallen asleep. Judah made fists again. He had believed that it would be easy to take care of everything for one day, he had been wrong. After putting his thoughts together he went out to look in the sand for the goats footprints. They wasn't hard to find and only some minutes after, he found the goat as well. Out of breath he ran over to her and took the rope she had around her neck.

"There you are you worthless …" he swallowed the remaining words and was about to go back home when the thunder came over him. He turned back and began to walk. The rain started, and then the lightning stroke. It made Judah fell to the ground. Only seconds later the mountain collapsed.


	3. Chapter 3

_**Chapter 3**_

"No" it was barely a whisper. Judah got a good hold on the goat, he was shivering at the same time as he continued to stare at the indescribable.

"No" he said again. He wrapped his arms around the goat and hugged it, then he started to cry. Something in his heart told him that he should go home to see if he could save his siblings but his legs just refused to move.

He didn't knew for how long he had been sitting like that when he finally forced his shaking legs to carry him.

He still held the goat in the rope which he nervously twisted around his arm. He couldn't see the house yet, there was still a few horrible metres left to walk, he fell to the ground again, cried a little more, swallowed several times and then continued walking.

Now he was beside the big rock. When he had walked past it, he would see it all. He crawled on his knees, he hadn't strength left to do anything else.

The mountain had collapsed, just as Joseph had told him, and obviously the goat had escaped.

Judah couldn't stop thinking about those two truths.

It had happened, it was only one thing his brother had told him that hadn't been proved. That they had been buried.

He sat down with his hand pressed against the big rock and with the goat still in the rope.

Slowly he rose and moved closer to the path. He supported himself against the rock.

He was shivering even more now, and he had hard to breath too.

Now all he needed to do was to take one more step.

He decided to take a deep breath and then run to look, but the breath did only became a sob and he still couldn't force himself to run, so he took a very slow step and looked down the valley.

Their house was buried.

Something was flashing in front of Judah's eyes and then he fainted.

***


	4. Chapter 4

_**Chapter 4**_

Dan moaned in pain and tried to get up, when he tried, he discovered that his arm was broken. Naphtali was the only one who was still asleep. Asher, Zebulon, Joseph and Dinah had woke up immediately when the stones fell over the house, Joseph went back to bed again and began to cry. Dan was the only one who was injured, but he wasn't too hurt to think.

"Someone have to put out the fire, otherwise we'll suffocate." He said weakly. Zebulon walked over to the fire and threw some sand on it to put it out. Then it suddenly went very dark inside. Naphtali woke up as he felt the smell of the dying fire.

"What's wrong?" Everyone was still very ill so it took them a little more time to figure out what had happened then usual. Joseph was the one who figured it out, or he already knew it to tell the truth. He had stopped crying now and crawled over to Dan like everyone else.

It was difficult to find anything to splint the arm with in the dark. But then Dinah noticed that it actually wasn't that dark. She had got used to the darkness and was able to see.

"Hey, I think there is an opening somewhere. I can see a little" when she had told her brothers', they noticed that they could see too. Asher and Naphtali walked around the walls, trying to find it, at the same time Zebulon, who was quite good at splinting, took care of Dan's arm. Dinah lighted a stick so he could see what he did. But the light also meant that the others couldn't look for the opening.

"Why did you do that?!" Asher yelled, but Dinah didn't care.

"You have to wait, we have to help Dan first" but now when he could see again, Joseph noticed something.

"Hey, weren't Judah hear earlier this morning? I mean, after the others left?"

"Are you sure? So they didn't go everyone?" Naphtali exclaimed.

"No, I met him after they had left. I am sure!" Naphtali looked at the walls again.

"Doesn't that mean he is somewhere outside?"

"Yes, if he didn't got killed by the stones!" Dinah said with a little sob. Dan's arm was splinted now so he was finally able to raise.

"Let out the stick now, we need to find the opening so we can call for him."


	5. Chapter 5

_**Chapter 5**_

Judah woke up when he felt the goat pull in the rope. He had succeed to tie it around his wrist, in some way, so the goat hadn't been able to escape. It was still raining, Judah sat up and looked at the house again. He swallowed several times and shook his head to prevent himself from fainting again.

"_Hello!"_ Judah let a scream escape from his mouth and quickly jumped up on his feet. There was no one there. No one he could see anyway.

"Who is it?"

"_You know who I am!"_ Suddenly Judah went angry. Angry enough to forget that he was afraid.

"And where have you been this entire day!" he shouted.

"_I have been right here all the time!_"

"Actually I haven't noticed that!"

"_No?, didn't I made Millennia run away so you wouldn't got trapped in the house like the others?"_ Judah stared at his baby brother's goat. "_And didn't you finally succeed with that extremely difficult knot that you have tried to tie for so many months?" _Now he stared at the rope around his wrist, it was true, he had made it… but.

"This had to happen, right?" he asked and looked up in the sky, he didn't saw anyone there but he couldn't think of a better direction to look. But the answer he got was really as far from what he had expected as it could ever be.

"_What_?" It took a while before he could answer.

"My brothers' and my sister! Why did they have to die?!"

"_Everyone has to die some time Judah, but you siblings still has many years left… Everyone!"_ Judah fell to the ground again, but this time he didn't faint.

"… You mean" Judah swallowed. "… They're still alive?"

"_Yes_!"


	6. Chapter 6

_**Chapter 6**_

Judah ran back to their home and tied Millennia to a tree close to the house. He walked up to the stones and looked everywhere in despair. He did definitely not have strength to move any of those stones, not even the smaller ones. Then something scared the goat. He ran back to her to see what it was. A snake, it had slithered out from the stone heap. Then Judah knew.

"It was you, you made them sick!"

"_You don't need to care about that Judah!"_

"But mum and dad don't know, they think…"

"_They caught sight of a snake in exactly the same time as you did, Zilpah is an educated nurse, she will understand, and make sure they get the right medicine. You have a task to solve here"_ Then he was gone. But it wasn't silent either. Someone cried for help.

It had to come from the same opening as the snake had escaped from. And where the snake had sneaked around was easy to see on the wet ground. Judah laid down on the ground, he could hear the screams better now, it was Zebulon.

"Zebulon!" the screams didn't stop, his brother couldn't hear him. Then he caught sight of the tree Millennia was tied to. He let her free and was about to start digging up the tree, when he saw some shadows in the mountains.

It was horrible shadows which made the little boy tremble in fear. He decided to ask God for help.

"Are you still with me?"

"_I'm always hear!"_

"Can you make those shadows disappear?"

"_Yes Judah, I can, but I don't think you want me to!"_ That answer did only make Judah more frightened, he didn't even dare to move anymore.

"What are they?"

"_Demons. The Devil's evil spirits. They are the contrast to the Angels. As long as you can see them, they can't hurt you, but they can hurt your brothers' and your sister!"_

"No!" a tear fell down Judah face.

"_You have to be strong Judah, I promise you that I will protect you from the demons but you have to help them out!"_

"But I thought you were almighty!"

"_So are he Judah, if I just jumps in to rescue them, then not even I can tell what he will do later, believe me Judah, it has to be this way"_

Then Judah stopped crying and tried to move one of the stones with the tree that he had dig up, it worked. It really wasn't much, but it was enough, they could at least see each other now.

"Have you put out the fire?" was the first Judah could think about to ask. They had.

"Dan is injured! His arm is broken" Zebulon told him before turning to the darkness inside. "Judah is all right!"

Dinah was small enough to climb out through the little hole so she did, and then she helped her brother to dig. Judah carried the soil away. Soon Joseph and Zebulon could crawl out too and then they and Dinah began to take over the digging from each other so that everyone got the rest they needed. Finally Judah climbed down to help Naphtali carry out Dan.

"What are we going to do now?" he asked the others when they finally were safe. They all still looked very ill and it couldn't be good for them to be outside in this rain. Dan gave him the solution.

"There is a cave a bit away, we can go there and sleep a while."

"…We can go there and wait for dad to come home." Asher decided and took one of the goat blankets that they had taken with them from their destroyed house.

"Asher wait, you don't even know where it is!" Dan yelled after him. Then he looked at the others. "Can anyone take my blanket?" Then he ran after Asher. And then _he_ was back.

"_Judah, make sure everyone is safe, the demons are coming. And I have to leave for your father" _

"What, wait, come back!" he yelled. Then he noticed that Joseph was staring at him.

"Who are you talking to?" so they couldn't hear him? Whatever!

"Run, all of you, run!" And they ran. And suddenly Joseph fell.

Judah, lifted him up and ran with him towards the cave, then Zebulon fell too. All of them fell, he began to carry them away one by one. The demons where everywhere. He could almost smell the flames of hell…


	7. Chapter 7

_**Chapter 7**_

Judah had fallen asleep in the opening of the cave. He had been completely exhausted. He woke up as the sun hit his face. Then he remembered the fire, he had forgot the fire he was meant to watch. Panting for air he sat up.

The fire was all right, it wasn't too big, or too small. Someone sat there watching it for him. Judah walked out of the cave to see who it was.

It was Dinah, she looked up when he came out to her and Judah noticed that she didn't seemed sick anymore.

"How are you?" he asked, there was a risk that she seemed ok even if she was dying and Judah didn't like that thoughts.

"I'm fine, all of us are fine. Except Dan, his arm still hurts." Suddenly Judah discovered that someone came towards him from behind. He turned around and saw his father. Evidently they had came back when they were sleeping… then Judah noticed that the cave was empty. Everyone had already woke up and walked outside. Even Dan was out.

"Dan is fine Judah, he and Joseph is out playing with Millennia" Jacob explained. Judah sank back on the improvised bed. Then he began to tell his father what had happened last night. It felt good to share it with someone.

Some days later their house was rebuilt, when all of them had got their health back and was able to help, that wasn't hard at all. But Judah and the others who had been through everything, had nightmares about it for weeks. They knew they had been very lucky that day, and if they forgot, all they needed was to look at Dan. He wasn't able to use his arm for months.

The snake escaped.


End file.
